Page 151 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

Salvatore Giuliano (1922–50) was Sicily’s most dashing anti-establishment hero –
and villain. Known to his comrades as Turiddu, he embodied the hopes and
frustrations of the Sicilian people more than any other individual in recent history.
Part of his charm lay in his long defiance of the government. Starting out as a petty
criminal and black-marketeer, he was a hunted man after his murder of a Carabiniere

who had challenged him as he transported stolen grain in 1943. Gathering a band of
followers in the mountains around his home in Montelepre, he was pursued by
platoons of hand-picked soldiers who combed the maquis for him. As his legend
grew, so did his charisma, enhanced by such madcap gestures as writing to President
Truman and offering the annexation of Sicily to the United States, in a last-ditch
attempt to sever the island from the Italian State.

Giuliano’s separatist ambitions led him into some disreputable alliances, and his

fall from grace occurred when he was shown to be behind the massacre of villagers
at Portella della Ginestra in 1947. Just three years later, he was betrayed and killed,
his body found in a courtyard in Castelvetrano, in the south. No one knows exactly
what happened or who was responsible for his death, though his deputy, Gaspare
Pisciotta, chose to confess to the crime. Many doubt that he was the one who pulled
the trigger, and Pisciotta himself was on the verge of making revelations at his trial
that would have implicated high-ranking Italian politicians, when he too was

assassinated in his cell at Ucciardone prison.

Whatever the truth, there’s a pungently Sicilian flavour to the affair, full of
corruption, betrayal and counter-betrayal, and Giuliano’s legend has since grown to
Robin Hood dimensions, nowhere more so than in his home territory around the
small town of Montelepre, where he was born. As his biographer Gavin Maxwell
was told: “They should change the name of that village, really – anything else but

Montelepre would do. No one can look at it straight or think straight about it now –
it just means Giuliano.” Giuliano hid out in the hills and caves around the village,
slipping into town at night to see family and friends; if you’re genuinely interested,
you may be able to persuade his nephew to show you around the house in which he
lived, to see various personal effects. His nephew also runs the Castello di
Giuliano, Via Pietro Merra 1, at the top of Montelepere on the road in from Carini (

091 894 1006, castellodigiuliano.it; €70), an eccentric hotel and restaurant built
to look like a castle, with more Giuliano memorabilia on display and faux-rustic
rooms; the baronial restaurant serves pasta, meat and fish grills and pizzas in the
evening (full meal €20).

Museo Civico

Via Giorgio Kastriota • Tues, Thurs & Sat 9.30am–1pm & 4–7pm, Wed & Fri 9.30am–1pm, Sun 10am–1pm • Free